Teoría Utilitarista

This section explains how the deep and protracted economic crisis of 1997–1998 sped up the maturation of crisis tendencies within the structure of the gender relations of production. To do so, I argue that the economic crisis exposed more clearly the internal contradictions in the structure of gender relations of production, which positioned men as family breadwinners and women as homemakers. As the economic crisis laid bare the unequal distribution of the patriarchal dividend supporting men’s masculine roles as family breadwinners, it triggered a gender-order crisis, which implicated the hegemony of bapakism. To unpack my argument, I will first explore the structure of the gender

relations of production and the crisis tendencies within it. Then, I will present my assessment on the extent to which the economic crisis implicated the structure and the hegemony of bapakism.

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The structure of the gender relations of production in Indonesia’s official gender order is premised in breadwinning men/homemaking women. Although the patterning is no longer taken for granted in the twenty-first century, it continues to dominate the ways in which most Indonesians imagine the ideal division of labour between men and women. Even in a contemporary urban context, where the male breadwinner ideal has been reworked to accommodate dual-income ideals, husbands still hold the

responsibility as primary breadwinners, while wives become secondary income earners (Utomo 2012). The ability to provide for one’s family means authority for men. As in patriarchal societies elsewhere, men’s economic autonomy generally gives them a secure sense of masculinity (Kimmel and Kaufman 1994: 261). Men who are unable to be providers or are not so inclined are often seen by society as less desirable, as having subordinate masculinity. In fact, as argued by Elmhirst (2007) and Nilan (2009a), many Indonesian men are likely to be frustrated when they are unable to secure employment or when they feel that their breadwinning role is taken over by women.

Prior to the nineteenth century, breadwinning was not a dominant feature of ideal masculinity in what is now Indonesia, and apparently this was the case throughout Southeast Asia. Anthony Reid, describes that the Dutch dealt with Aceh women in tin trades in the seventeenth century (1988: 635, see also Compostel 1636: fol. 1200). It was also the norm for women to trade, including export–import, in other areas of the Netherland East Indies, now Indonesia, such as the Moluccas and Java. In southern Vietnam, women performed many tasks generally reserved for men in the European or Indian context; the tasks included ploughing, harrowing, reaping, carrying heavy burdens, attending shops, brokering and money-changing (Reid 2014: 150).

However, towards the late-nineteenth century, men’s economic dependence on women and women’s economic autonomy gradually became obsolete in Southeast Asia. In this period, Southeast Asians, especially the middle classes, became fascinated with

Chapter 2. A Gender-Order Crisis

the Western model of modernity. Part of the then modern gendered moral vision was encouraging men to be breadwinners and women to be homemakers (Reid 2014). The increasing popularity of this reorganisation of the gender division of labour was partly due to the stronger grip of puritan Christian morality among the urban middle classes in Europe at that time (Locher-Scholten 2000; Reid 2014; Seccombe 1986).3 As depicted in advertisement pieces published in Pandji Poestaka magazines in first quarter of 1940,

the middle-class segment of society was inspired to give up their traditional habits and adopt a modern lifestyle in order to be included as ‘cultural citizens of the colony’ partly by adopting the aforementioned gender division of labour (Nordholt 2011). The shifting gender relations of production were further cemented by the Islamic reform movement taking place at the same period. The movement justified that the virtue of Muslim women was primarily vested in their domestication and devotion to their husbands, while Muslim men’s virtue was premised mainly on their capacity to lead their family into Islam, provide a livelihood and protection for their family members (Florida 1996: 210–12).

Under the New Order, breadwinning men/homemaking women became the official ideal gender relations of production. The state’s recognition of men as heads of families strengthened the prioritisation of men in accessing and owning resources. For instance, the New Order’s internal migration program enabled men, rather than women, to access land ownership and other resources because of their status as heads of

households and their role as family providers (Dawson 1994). Furthermore, men’s role as breadwinners for the family culturally led men to get better access to education than women, especially in rural areas (Japan International Agency 1999). At school, young boys formally learned the notions of ideal masculinity (Blackwood 2005: 295); they

3 _{In fact, this new conception of gender relations had become pervasive even among the working classes} throughout the developed capitalist world by World War I (1914) although total influence was never a reality (Seccombe 1986: 54).

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were oriented towards the workplace and pursuit of a career in the public sphere (Parker 1993). In the workforce, men were likely to receive higher wages than women in similar positions (Seguino 2000; Siegmann 2007).4 In short, Indonesian men as a group

received patriarchal dividends to facilitate them to become bapak.

Such gender patterning bears several internal contradictions, making the

structure of gender relations of production prone to crisis. First, not all men have access to good employment which enables them to be primary, let alone sole, family

breadwinners. This crisis tendency was detected during the New Order period. A study conducted by Carol Hetler (1990) in Central Java in the 1980s shows that the double- income household model was prevalent among the poor. In fact, the double income was an important strategy promoted to cope with the economic pressure at that time (Niehof 2004). In female-headed households, which accounted for 14 per cent of the total households in Indonesia in 1990s (Buvinić and Gupta 1997: 261), women filled the role in the absence of male breadwinners. Many women in poor communities shared the responsibility of providing for the family, for instance by collecting food, fodder and fuel for the family’s subsistence; yet, these roles were barely recognised formally (Dutt 2006: 216). Moreover, men in poor communities, whose wives worked overseas, had to do the domestic work in the latter’s absence (K. Robinson 2009: 106). In short, the unequal distribution of access to employment made many men unable to fulfil the role of primary or sole breadwinner for their families during the New Order period.

Second, certain industries and professions which favour women more than men have made women’s involvement in formal economy inevitable. As the country’s economy shifted from oil and construction to the manufacturing of consumer goods, retail and services in the early 1980s, the entry of women into the formal economy was

4 _{In 1986, women’s hourly wage was 58 per cent of their male counterparts. Although in 1997, this figure} had increased to 65 per cent the gender pay gap was still stark (Feridhanusetyawan and Aswicahyono 2001, quoted in Siegmann 2007: 118).

Chapter 2. A Gender-Order Crisis

inescapable (K. Robinson 2009: 90). This trend continues into the twenty-first century. In 2001, more than 15 per cent of the female workforce was accommodated in

manufacturing and 25 per cent in wholesale and retail trades (Siegmann 2007: 118). Even before the shift to industrialisation, certain professions, albeit those regarded as the extension of women’s domestic roles, also favoured women’s labour. Such included midwives, pre-school teachers, nurses and domestic assistants. Consequently, the New Order state also encouraged women to take part in the burgeoning industrialisation, despite this encouragement contradicting the dominant patterning of the gender relations of production.

The wider opportunities for women to pursue higher education also became a significant crisis in the official structure of the gender relations of production. It is strongly evident in Indonesia, as in other developing countries, that spending more years in education has the tendency to delay marriage among young women

(Buttenheim and Nobles 2009). The burgeoning new economy since the early 1970s opened up better access to higher education for women. In general, the pursuit of higher education also opens up opportunities for class mobility; in fact, as stated by Wendy Minza (2015) and Suzanne Naafs (2018), for a great many young Indonesians, diplomas of higher education have been tickets to a better future by allowing them to become urban professionals. As a result, the pursuit of higher education among women has led to an increase of women in formal paid work, especially in urban areas. Culturally, this phenomenon has contributed to shifting images of ideal femininity in Indonesia. Along with the development of the second wave of feminism globally, affluent working women have become key signifiers of Indonesian modernity since the 1980s. As demonstrated by Sen (1998), images of working women proliferated in Indonesian

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advertisement pieces in printed magazines in the 1980s.5 However, we should not expect that the established ideal of femininity was entirely uprooted. In fact, as reflected by their representations in Indonesian cinema and print media, Indonesian women were still expected to prioritise their reproductive and domestic roles despite their

increasingly significant involvement in the economy, politics and culture (Brenner 1999; Sen 1994).

Under the New Order, the above-mentioned internal contradictions were offset by state and non-state actors through various strategies. First and foremost, there was a constant campaign of the discourse of kodrat wanita (women’s nature) through policies

and popular culture that was justified by the official religions. The discourse basically promoted women’s reproductive roles as mothers as the key defining feature of ideal femininity. These roles must be maintained at the expense of women’s career pursuits in the public sphere (Brenner 1999). In turn, kodrat wanita reinforced women’s

stereotypical role as ‘the companion of their husbands’, which made women’s status as workers subordinated to their status as housewives (Ford and Parker 2008: 9) and their contribution to the family income was secondary to that of men (Utomo 2012).

Moreover, the Ministry of Women’s Affairs successfully created a profile for working women as bearing ‘dual roles’, encompassing paid work and domestic responsibilities in the early 1980s (Blackburn 2004: 182). To cope with the dual responsibilities, economically affluent career women often reallocated their domestic caring

responsibilities to female (usually older) relatives or female domestic servants (Elmhirst 2005). These practices compensated for the necessity and increase of women’s

involvement in the public sphere without necessarily transforming the gender order.

5 _{According to Gabriel Griffin (2017) in the online version of the Oxford Dictionary of Gender Studies,} second-wave feminism, which flourished from 1965–1985, is associated with identity politics and campaigns for gender equality at the workplace, women’s bodily autonomy, abortion on demand, economic recognition of domestic work, as well as the acknowledgment and prosecution of gender-based violence. The movement which began in the US and the UK soon spread globally.

Chapter 2. A Gender-Order Crisis

Consequently, the hegemony of bapakism was sustained during most of the New Order

period.

Considerable shifts in the macro economy due to the 1997 Asian economic crisis forced major changes in Indonesia’s gender order. The macro-economic outlook at the onset of the crisis in 1997 and 1998 had strong gendered and class-segmented

implications at the micro level.6 The decline of the currency value significantly affected economic institutions reliant on foreign-investment, which apparently employed a high proportion of the male production (Smith et al. 2002) and had been responsible for creating Indonesia’s emerging middle classes (Poppele, Sumarto and Pritchett 1999). Consequently, middle-class men, especially in urban areas, suffered the biggest income shock during the crisis (Smith et al. 2002: 173).7 This condition was complicated by the upward spiralling of the price of commodities in the first quarter of 1998 (Thomas and Frankenberg 2004: 518–19).8

Eventually, the sudden economic reversal of fortune exposed more clearly the abovementioned crisis tendencies within the established gender relations of production. Many men (no longer only poor men), found it harder to be breadwinners at that time. Male government employees and export-commodity farmers, while exempted from wage cuts, were not excluded from the double impact of soaring prices and high inflation (Chen 2010: 301). Declining wages also made it more difficult to be able to afford the services of domestic assistants for middle-class families (Elmhirst 2005:

6 _{At the macro level, Indonesia’s GDP shrunk by almost 14 per cent (Betcherman and Islam 2001: 5), and} in 1999 there was an increase of only 1 per cent (Bank Indonesia 2000). For a country whose Gross National Product (GNP) had grown around 4.5 per cent per annum from the mid-1960s to1998, a contraction of this magnitude meant a substantial readjustment (James P. Smith et al. 2002: 164). Indonesia also experienced an 80 per cent currency depreciation, and a 50 per cent inflation rate (The World Bank 1998: 1).

7 _{While the overall real wages declined by 41 per cent on average (Betcherman and Islam 2001: 14), and} affected both men and women, for urban middle-class men: ‘the single year shift in the wage distribution virtually wiped out all wage gains made since 1986 … but … [women] have maintained some of the wage gains since 1986’ (J.P. Smith et al. 2002: 173).

8 _{Food prices rose by about 20 per cent more than the general price index.} 61

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254).9 The reliance on women’s contributions to the family income was also clearer during the crisis. This led to impending changes in their relations with the men in their households (Hancock 2001). The notion of kodrat wanita and pendamping suami could

no longer counterbalance the internal contradictions of the structure of the gender relations of production. Crisis of the gender order at the turn of the millennium was inevitable.

The crisis within the gender order implicated masculinities and the social relations producing them. On one hand, it triggered frustration among men who lost their capacity to be breadwinners. As observed by many scholars, including Elmhirst (2007), Noorhaidi Hasan (2016), Stein Kristiansen (2003) and Pam Nilan, Argyo Demartoto and Alex Broom (2013), frustration and violence were common masculine responses to the changing economy which had taken away many men’s ability to earn enough income and thus undermined their masculinity. Between January and March 1998, the economic disempowerment triggered men in at least 23 locations in Indonesia to sporadically loot shops and food warehouses: 266 shops and warehouses were

reportedly looted, destroyed and burnt; 79 vehicles burnt; and five people died

(Tadjoeddin 2002:16).10 Emasculation among men also manifest in widespread sexual violence in several cities in Indonesia in 1998 (Wandita 1998).11 This scale of violence motivated by economically driven emasculation indicates the erosion of the hegemony of bapakism, which was premised partly on male breadwinning practices. Violence was

9 _{According to Elmhirst, the increasing involvement of women in formal work in the 1980–1990s was} facilitated more significantly not by the state or men, but by paid domestic workers. Consequently, the shifting relations of labour were not accompanied by reconfigurations of domestic responsibilities between men and women. Middle-class Indonesians, the segment hit hardest during the economic crisis, continued to employ domestic assistants although they had to make financial adjustments in order to deal with their own aggravating economic insecurities (Elmhirst 2005: 254).

10 _{This number is based on the incidents reported in media; 15 incidents took place in Java (Tadjoeddin} 2002: 16)

11 _{The victims of raids, looting, and sexual violence that took place in 1998 were mostly Indonesian of} Chinese descent. While acknowledging that the economic crisis exacerbated the existing social conflict, the ethnic dimension of the crisis and its aftermath is beyond the scope of this thesis.

Chapter 2. A Gender-Order Crisis

apparently one of the prominent ways for men to reclaim the hegemony of bapakism at

the onset of the economic crisis.

In addition, the gender-order crisis triggered by the sudden reversal of economic fortune, which was complicated by political chaos, led to stronger structural attempts to defend the hegemonic configuration of an ideal masculinity. In the post-authoritarian era, structural movements within Indonesia’s legal system and culture designed to limit women’s involvement in the economy became more visible. For instance, women had to face night curfews prescribed in newly enforced regional bylaws, enabled by the decentralisation policy that had been in place since 1999. Andi Yentriyani, head of the Public Participation Subcommission of the National Commission on Elimination of Violence against Women, explained in a press conference (14 September 2012) that until 2012, there were at least 38 regional bylaws which limited women’s participation in the public sphere through the implementation of night curfews and the requirement for women to be accompanied by male family members when going out at night. Such limitations reinforced the stereotypical image of women as the weaker gender, who must be protected while navigating certain spaces which are not normally part of their feminine domain. Furthermore, the limitation also implied time restrictions for women who were pursuing careers in the public sphere.

Islamic rhetoric was deployed by various interest groups to highlight the Islamic nature of the male breadwinning norm that was strongly characterised in bapakism. In

2003, a heated public debate on polygamy took place and involved various segments of Indonesian society. Devoted polygamy practitioner and wealthy businessman, Puspo Wardoyo, contextualised the necessity for rich Muslim men to take more than one wife. For Puspo Wardoyo, polygamy, among other reasons, ensured that more women could enjoy comfortable lives (Suryono 2003). Implicit in this statement of purpose behind his support for the pro-polygamy campaign is the reassertion of men’s role as family

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breadwinners, and their normalised obligation to keep women bound to the domestic sphere.

In the second decade of the third millennium, the public debate on gender roles became increasingly heated as new media platforms augmented its visibility. In 2013, a series of controversial tweets on how to be good Muslim women and perform ideal Muslim femininity were made by a prominent young Muslim preacher, Felix Siauw. In a tweet dated 28 May 2013 he lashed out at working women: ‘When a mother spends 3 hours with her children and 8 hours at work, is she a mother or an employee?’ The tweets represented an attempt to restore a certain form of femininity—one that

supported the construction of hegemonic masculinity. They also represent his support of the restoration of hegemonic bapakism. The tweet and his other tweets on women and

gender immediately developed into a heated public debate, albeit mostly online (Hestya 2013).

The gender-order crisis also opened up opportunities for a fiercer struggle to emerge around attempts to reconfigure the hegemonic ideal masculinity. The complex process of democratisation in the post-authoritarian era significantly contributed to the flourishing of alternative forces attempting to uproot bapakism from its hegemonic

position. These forces included feminist and women’s movements, as well as men’s movements for gender equality. The growing feminist and women’s movement supported women’s increased involvement in the public sphere, including in formal paid work and politics. Breadwinning was no longer a practice which was to be